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Slightly improved outlook for EU summer crops

Aug212017

According to the latest JRC MARS crop monitoring Bulletin for Europe, published today, heatwaves and scarce precipitation persisted in July and at the beginning of August in large parts of the Mediterranean, central and eastern European regions. However, summer crops in Austria, Hungary, central Romania, Bulgaria and Greece benefited from adequate rainfall, which mitigated the negative effects of the hot conditions. In western and northern Europe, mild temperatures and average to above-average rainfall since the second half of July also benefited summer crops. However, frequent rainfall hampered the harvesting of spring and winter cereals and raised quality concerns.

At the EU level, the forecast for grain maize was revised slightly upwards compared to last month and is now just above the five-year average but below last year’s yield, as marked downward revisions for Italy, and Slovakia were more than compensated for by upward revisions for Romania, Hungary, Austria, Bulgaria France and Germany. The forecasts for green maize, sunflowers and sugar beet were also revised upwards. The yield forecast for winter cereals remained stable at the EU level: downward revisions of soft wheat yields in Germany, the UK, and Ireland (mainly due to the difficult conditions around harvesting) were compensated for by an upward revision for France.